Orbitas
by cappuccino girl
Summary: "It's all just regrets and what ifs." (post-ep for Posse Comitatus)


Orbitas 

Author: Cappuccino Girl

Genre: Angst. Drama. CJ/Simon

Rating: PG-13

Notes: Following the events of Posse Comitatus. 

Thanks as always to all the many wonderful people who inspire me. I am forever grateful.  

Summary: It's just regrets and what ifs.

~ Wrapped in brown paper, and tied up in ribbons. For Kansas. Because you were there all the way. ~

She'd been having a recurring dream of dancing along rivers. At first she thought she might have caught five minutes of Everybody Says I Love You on the TV, but she rarely has the time or energy for films late at night. So when she awoke for the third time in ten days with images of red floaty skirts and the muddy waters of the Scène in her mind, she was convinced that there was a meaning to it all.

When she was fifteen she used to dream of running barefoot along a never ending beach, and when she stirred the next morning, she could almost feel the sand between her toes. She misses the sea now, and she'd gladly wake up with  the smell of salt water in her nose and grains of sand tickling her feet.

"I've been having a recurring dream of dancing along rivers," she told him late at night while he played with the frayed sleeve of her  sweater. 

"Am I dancing with you?" he had asked, and she remembers smiling at the affection in his voice. 

~* *~

She's been home for six hours and nineteen minutes. Nothing looks like it has changed. The hot water faucet in the kitchen still leaks; unpaid bills are on a neat pile beside an unopened copy of The Progressive. In the empty corner by her apartment door, in granules at the bottom of a cup of coffee which was never made, in the sports section from a three day old paper, she sees the imprint he has left. She contemplates hurling them across the room, but she can barely bring herself to touch what is left of him, so she collapses on the floor instead. Closing her eyes, she can almost feel his hand on her arm and taste him on her tongue. 

She used to walk to work each morning, rather than drive. She felt that the fresh air cleared her head, and then she found herself being pushed hastily into the back of cars with darkened windows, and they always drove her home. The walks in May tended to be exquisite, the street near her house covered in a film of pink and white petals after the winds had blown them from the cherry trees. Sometimes, while she walked down the road, a breeze would pick them up,  causing petals to swirl about her feet in a pastel river.

She was driven to work for the past month; a bunch of yellow and red Carnations in the bathroom had replaced her petal filled wanderings. She can't stand to look at the wilted bunch sitting on top of the shelf. 

~* *~

"What's this about?" she inquired. The pretty bouquet looked rather lost in her hands, but the  yellows and reds did add a splash of color to her dark gray suit.  

"I'm tired of your whining."

"I whine?"

"Constantly, and while I don't usually understand it, I can get that you are pissed about my encroaching on your daily appreciation of nature, or whatever other fancy phrase it is that you use," he explained calmly, "And so I decided to bring a little bit of the outdoors to you."

 "Thanks, but isn't this against some Secret Service code?" she asked as she wandered towards the kitchen.

"About ten actually, but they can go to hell for once."

She stuck her index finger under the faucet and waited until the water went cold. "Twice, actually, because I'm sure that your inappropriate comments wouldn't pass the rule book either."

His eyes widened. "Inappropriate comments? I am always polite."

"That you may be, but some of your remarks are, well, not too great," she said, shoving the vase under the stream of cool water.

"How?"

"They could be seen as sexist."

He stood beside her, blank expression on his face. "This is news."

"Is it? Well, then it's about time it reached you."

"So, don't just leave me hanging here. An example," he requested.

"Well, when you came into my office, you said that you didn't need to see me naked or anything."

"Which I don't."

"Yes but you see, that's so blatantly obvious that by stating that fact, you were actually being inappropriate."

"I was?"

"Yes."

"You're really going to have to point these things out to me, because I still don't see how that was wrong."

"How can you not?"

"Please don't make me explain," he sighed

She smiled, arranging the Carnations in glass vase. One of them always insisted on drooping down, away from the rest of the bunch, no matter how many times she fiddled with the stalks.

He leant towards the sink, trying not to slip on the patch of wet where she had shook the flowers.  "Mind if I boil the kettle?"

~* *~

Josh follows her to the couch, a cup of tea in either hand. Taking a seat, he watches her as she tries to hide behind the pillow she's clutching. Maybe it can save her. He notices how she can't seem to keep her fingers steady, so he reaches across and takes hold of them, asks her why without using any words.

She shakes her head, no, but something in his face causes her to say, "I haven't been able to keep anything down."

"Have you slept?"

"What the fuck do you think."

He knows this too, can remember it clearly from his own losses. Grasping her hand firmly he tells her, "You can't keep doing this."

"I'm doing all I can."

Reaching to his pocket, he pulls out a card and gives it to her. "You.. You have to  go."

She regards the card like it might pounce on her at any minute. "It's very thoughtful of you, but I'm fine, really." She attempts a positive face, but it's painful  for him to watch her try.

"It's very thoughtful of me? You said you haven't been able to eat for a week."

"It's just regrets and what ifs," she downplays, her voice soft, yet still brittle.

"Regrets'll kill you."

"I just have to get back to work and forget about it," she says, pausing to blow on her tea before taking a sip. "This sitting around isn't doing me any good."

"Have you spoken to Leo?"

She glances up from  her cup. "Who, me? God no. Well, I have for the obligatory briefing, but not about- you know. I'm going back on Tuesday." 

"Oh, okay."

"Yeah. I figure it'd be best that way." Her words seem to hang in the air, all scripted and awkward, and it makes him shift uncomfortably beside her.

"Promise me." He swallows heavily, eyes closing for a moment. "Promise me you'll get help."

~* *~

"Do you want any help with that?"

"I'm fine, Simon," she remarked coldly, taking her habitual place behind him, her heels clicking down the sidewalk.

She swung the bag back and forth, the paper corner catching her leg every now and then. When he listened carefully, he could just hear her swearing under her breath at how he walked in front rather than beside her. 

After a moment she let out a sigh and veered left. "Caffeine," she stated. The door made a jingling sound when she opened it rather too enthusiastically, and waited for him to enter before letting go of the handle. 

"Starbucks?" he asked.

"I have been up since, well, you know since when, and I need caffeine," she explained, tossing the bag onto a chair.

He smiled. "What do you want?"

Her eyebrows arched, intrigued. "Excuse me?"

"What do you want? I'm buying."

"Oh you are. How very gentlemanly of you."

"Well, I wasn't thinking of the gentlemanly factor as much as I was of your now depleted bank balance," he remarked, pointing to the bag.

She grinned. "That's very funny, but before I started this job, I was earning a decent salary. I still have some stashed away."

"And so you decided to use some of it to buy a dress," he deduced.

"They do teach you well at agent school," she smirked. "So, my coffee?"

"Yeah, you never answered my question. What do you want?"

"I don't know. Get me something you think I might like," she told him, her tone teasing and playful. 

"Such as?"

"You pick."

He nodded before walking towards the counter. 

"Sure you should be leaving me here, all unguarded and in the open?" she called after him.

"I can watch you from here," he said from his place in the queue. 

She ran her hand through her hair, exasperated that he was right once again.  He is always right, she mused, and has a nice ass. He'd probably look great in jeans. Hardly a moment had gone by, and he'd turned and faced her, eyes scanning the room while he waited.  She just sat there and played with the black string handle of the bag, watching the interesting characters who walked in and out. While she noticed the papers people carried, or how all the men seemed to come in with younger women, she thought Simon probably looked for hand movements, and pointless lingering outside the coffee shop window.  She wondered if their two viewpoints could cause some strange new age style four dimensional vision if they merged. 

"One coffee for the lady," a voice said at her side, causing her to snap out of the pleasant daydream. 

Her eyes lit up. "Thank you." She looked first at the cup, then him. "What is it?"

"Tall non-fat caramel cappuccino."

She scrunched up her face. "May I ask why?"

"I thought it describes you best."

"Oh you're a riot," she said before taking a sip. "Can't you ever sit down? It really makes me nervous when you pace around like you do."

"I can't see everyone when I sit down, can I?"

She let out a deep breath. "I guess you can't." Her finger slid along the rim of the cup, picking up the cocoa which had missed the foamy top.  He watched her lick it. "You know, your job's rather illogical."

"It is?" he asked without losing his overview of the room. 

"Yes."

"So is yours."

"I know."

"I'm glad you do. Why is mine illogical?"

"Well, you are supposed to be protecting me from some crazed stalker person, right?"

He looked at her for a moment. "Yes."

"But the way you protect me from that person is by becoming a stalker yourself."

"I'm a stalker?"

"Yes. You follow me everywhere. You watch me. You stand outside my apartment door. You stalk," she replied casually, taking a sip from her coffee.

"I protect you. I don't stalk," he said indignantly. 

"I'm your boss, and I say you do."

"You're not my boss."

"Fine, pseudo-boss then."

He nodded, his back almost turned to her again. "Why are you flirting with me?"

"I'm sorry?" she questioned, her blue eyes widening.

"Nothing," he said, his back still facing her, and she hated how he could talk to her like that. 

She was silent, aside from tapping her shoe on the leg of the table. The tasteful background music had stopped, making the room seem unusually still.

"You said something," she prodded eventually.

He turned around, gazed straight in her eyes and blurted, "I'd like to date you but we both know that it's wrong, so nothing is ever going to happen. You could probably waltz in one day wearing that killer dress, take it off, and nothing would happen," he said quickly, then paused, studying the expression of mild amusement on her face. "Oh, that's what you meant the other day when you said that I make inappropriate remarks. Give me a few weeks and I'll have perfected the skill of non harassing communication."

She had laughed, eyes dancing. "It's fine, honest, but just this time."

~* *~

"I'm fine, honest," she says unconvincingly.

She studies the tissue in her hand. The soft paper doesn't crumple, it just forms tiny waves of white between her slender fingers. Her eyes are damp, the tissue dry, because she's just playing with it to provide herself with distraction. 

A woman across from her adjusts her glasses. "You said you've been feeling sick."

CJ nods, still fascinated by the ripples of the tissue.

"What in particular seems to make you feel that  way?"

"Eating. Sleeping. Everything," she procrastinates, and soft brown eyes intently watch her slumped forward shoulders and downcast expression.

"I mean, what is going through your mind at the time when you notice yourself feeling sick?" The woman twirls her pen, glances subtly at her watch.

"I don't quite think I follow."

"You're smart. Of course you do. What do you think of that makes you feel sick?"

The words seem to punctuate themselves. Makes. You. Feel. Sick. She flinches at the K in sick. It's like a kick in the stomach, kickback from a gun.  

"Him," she says, and she might as well be throwing up.

"The Agent?"

She nods.

"I can only help you, if you honestly tell me what is going on," the woman says mildly.

"I know, and I will, it's just… It's difficult to process, that's all." She wishes her chair would turn, so that she could swivel around. Oh the world for yet another distraction. 

"What is it about him that makes you feel this way?"

"It's…" she gulps, willing her tears to stay inside. "I can't go anywhere without being reminded of him."

"There must be some places, surely?"

"No, I mean, I can't even go to my fucking bathroom, because there's this bouquet of flowers which he bought me, and it just seems wrong to move them."

"Why does it seem wrong?"

She looks up, eyes pleading for an answer, but all she gets is repetition thrown back at her.

"Why does it seem wrong, CJ?"

"Because he bought them for me."

"So it's the act of affection that you associate with the flowers that prevents you from  removing them."

"Yes… No… I guess so," she stammers.

"What else?"

"What do you mean?"

"You said everything. That was just one example. What else reminds you?"

"My car."

The woman raises her eyebrows, requesting more details. 

"He messed around with it so I couldn't bolt from his protection, and I went to my car to drive here to you today, and it didn't start, because he…" her voice grows quiet as a tear falls down her cheek. Straining to keep what's left of her composure, she says, "He took the spark plugs out, and the battery, and a bunch of other things, and now I have to call a mechanic to get my car fixed."

The room is still, and the woman sitting opposite CJ doesn't even scribble anything onto her notepad.

~* *~

"Why are you so quiet?"

She opened her eyes, looked up at him. "I was thinking."

He sighed, "Anything in particular?"

"I was thinking of the time I went to go and see The Bodyguard with a boyfriend."

"Was this Danny?"

"You know about me and Danny?"

"I've read your file."

"Oh my God. Danny and I are in my file?" she exclaimed, a look of horror painted across her previously contented face.

 "Yes, and David Cunningham, and Lionel Thompson, and Mark Aldmire, and Tad Whitney, and-"

"Tad Whitney? Tad Whitney was in that file?"

"Yes sir-ee."

She threw her head back in exasperation. "You have got to be kidding me."

"I wish I was. You did seem to go through quite a lot of men while you lived in California."

"That's none of your business."

He glanced around the room, unable to shake the habits of his job. "Okay. So, what did you think of The Bodyguard?"

"Huh?"

"The movie, you said you went to go and see it with a-"

"Oh yeah. It sucked. Whitney Houston singing. Kevin Costner saving her ass. So predictable and cliché. What did you think?"

"I never saw it."

"You never saw it? I thought everyone saw that movie, just like they did Silence of the Lambs."

"Now that was good." 

"Scared the shit out of me," she confessed, wrapping her arms around herself. He thought how it made her look like a little girl when she did that, those wide eyes staring up at him.

"I'll bet."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing." He put his feet up on the coffee table. "Jodie Foster's hot though."

"Well, that's me out of the picture then," she laughed, emptying her glass of wine, and as she took the final swing, his hand moved over and touched her shoulder. She shivered a little, and he could feel the knots of tense muscle beneath his fingers. 

"I guess I overdid things at the gym today," she said defensively. 

He moved his finger in a circle, pushing down heavily, feeling her slowly relax beneath his touch. "Is that better?"

She nodded, and somehow she found her head resting on his arm. He tucked her hair behind her ear, and rubbed the frayed sleeve of the gray sweater she was wearing between his fingers. 

"I've been having a recurring dream of dancing along rivers," she whispered as she let her eyes close. 

"Am I dancing with you?" she heard him say, and the question sent warm sensations rushing through her body. 

"I don't know," she told him honestly, curling up closer beside him.

He stroked her rumpled clothes, watched as rest drifted in. He reached over the back of the couch, and picked up the dark brown throw, tucked it around her. She was rarely this quiet, so he let her lie there and switched off the lights.

~* *~

She squints, the sun blinding her as she stares out of the window rather than at the figure sitting opposite her.  

"We've talked about the association with objects and actions, but you still won't tell me the root, and until we address that, I can't fully help you."

"I… I really am telling you everything," she lies because she's spent six godforsaken hours in this office so far, and it still feels like an interrogation rather than a healing process. 

"Fine. It is your time," the doctor tells her.

"Oh Jesus, would you quit saying that to me."

"Alright."

"Do you know a thing about what is going on here?" she exclaims, the corners of her mouth quivering slightly.

"No, because you keep covering everything up from me, from those who care about you. I don't think you've ever let anyone into that closely guarded treasure chest of emotions."

Across the room, CJ  just sits there, stunned.

"But I don't need you to tell me all the details," the doctor goes on, "Because I can see what is going on here without you saying a word. It would do you good tell at least one person though. The whole purpose of these sessions is to process the situation."

CJ  looks at her hands, moves her fingers rhythmically over one another. If she is going to be honest, then no one may see her face. 

"It was at the theater. I had teased him a little I think, and then we were interrupted by a phone call telling him that the stalker had been caught. He was hardly off the phone when he told me the news, and yeah, it was a huge relief, but most of all it was the magic ticket. He was no longer assigned to me, and I was.." She rubs her forehead and her eyes narrow as she tries to recall those precious moments. "I don't know what I was, but I gave him a peck on the cheek as thank you and it was-" she smiles. "Oh God there was this incredible electricity. And then we kissed, and I honestly don't remember that much except that I thought I was falling for a thousand miles. We both knew we  had to go back to the show, but we agreed to meet afterwards for a drink. Who knows how I found my way back. I doubt I could even have read a stop sign in my state, and…" she covers her face with her hands. Taking a deep breath she states, "That was the last time saw him. And then some time during the second act, Ron came and got me and told me it was over."

The woman is silent, for her experience has taught her many times that there is always more than what is first offered.

CJ moves a little further into the corner of the couch. "You know, when Ron showed up, I thought it was all going to be about how Simon could never see a former protectee socially, and instead all he had to say was…" She can't bring herself to end the sentence. " I am such a fucking self centered bitch. Just think if I would have…" her voice trails off again, and at least a minute passes before she can complete her thought. " If I would have stood outside and he wouldn't have showed up, I would have thought he'd stood me up, you know. Do you realize that? He would have been dead there in that  fucking convenience store where he never really had to go, and I would have been cursing him."

"But you never did that."

"But I would have and-" She tears her hands from her face, revealing her red eyes for the first time. "God, I feel like such a tragic heroine, and the bitter irony of it is that it's all because of some stupid Shakespeare production he insisted on accompanying me to."

"I wish I could tell you it can all be undone. You can't blame yourself for decisions you never were able to make."

" I know, but why… Why did I have to love him so fucking much?"

~* *~

She drove the car into the garage again today after it had been mended. The coffee cups are all washed up and form a neat row on the counter. She's put a large potted plant in the corner of the hall, and washed the brown throw which hangs freshly ironed over her beige chair. The sports section from the paper has been habitually dumped in the trash.  Five old hardback books sit on a pile at her bedside table, two red flowers pressed dry between their covers. Curling up on the bed in her favorite pajamas, she willfully closes her eyes for the first time in weeks, and when she sleeps, she dreams of dancing along rivers, and her partner's face is crystal clear.

~ the end~

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feedback as always to: cappuccinogirlie@hotmail.com

visit the author's website at www.cappuccinogirl.com  


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